


Playing House

by chezamanda



Category: Marvel (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (2012)
Genre: Community: trope_bingo, Domestic Avengers, F/M, Fake/Pretend Relationship, First Time, Morning Sex, Neighbors, Pre-Avengers Movie, Resolved Sexual Tension, Sharing a Bed, Tropes, Undercover
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-02-07
Updated: 2013-02-07
Packaged: 2017-11-28 13:02:51
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 8,825
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/674688
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/chezamanda/pseuds/chezamanda
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>In order to investigate a pair of Russian agents hiding out in Southern California, Clint and Natasha have to go undercover as the new residents of a gated community.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks to the Hive Mind as per usual and also to that episode of The X Files that I *cough*ripped off*cough* drew inspiration from. Also, to my brother for living on the street where I got the community name. Yes, we do make jokes about it just like Clint does.

Of all the things that Natasha Romanoff had been asked to do for a mission, being a housewife had to be the weirdest. There wasn’t any doubt in her mind that she couldn’t, but her domestic skills had never really come into play in her work with S.H.I.E.L.D. In order to fit into her cover and the conservative gated community where she and Clint were headed, Natasha had to buy a new wardrobe. She wasn’t one for sweater sets, but from the intel in her mission folder, the women in this community did not do worn jeans and fitted t-shirts. There was now a considerable amount of beige and pastel in her closet.

Natasha hated beige.

Clint didn’t seemed thrilled about the polo shirt and chinos he was wearing either. Every couple of seconds, he fidgeted with the collar or shifted in his seat and Natasha tried not to laugh. Tactical gear was perfectly fine, but a pair of khaki pants and a collared shirt made him uncomfortable. She looked out the window at the desert thousands of miles below as she ran through her cover’s facts once again. 

_Natalie Anderson, 30, grew up in Westchester County, graduated from Columbia with a degree in Art History but decided to be a housewife, married three years to one Clint Anderson, really likes pastels..._

As soon as they landed at S.H.I.E.L.D.’s west coast headquarters, they were given the keys to a silver Audi registered in their covers’ names and a moving van full of their “belongings.” A couple of agents rode in the van to pose as movers. Clint seemed to fall easily into his role as man of the house and insisted on driving. Natasha gave a sidelong look before putting her nose back in the dossier. The Andersons’ soon-to-be neighbors, the Greenes, were suspected Russian sleeper agents were part of a network that operated on the west coast and were linked to a series of attacks throughout the western United States. 

The drive to Orange County took a little over an hour, giving Clint and Natasha enough time to make sure their stories were straight. Gentlewind Bay closed itself off from the rest of the world with a large iron gate and keycode access. 

“They should’ve just called it Silent-But-Deadly Bay,” Clint remarked as they drove through the opened gates. 

Natasha snorted quietly and looked out the passenger window.

A chill ran down Natasha’s spine. There were three styles of home in this neighborhood and they formed a pattern along the street. Even the mailboxes and flowers in the front yards followed the same pattern, as though each façade style had a specific type of flower bed that matched it. Natasha wondered if the residents of Gentlewind Bay coordinated their outfits on a daily basis. Given Clint’s natural desire to be removed from the crowd, Natasha knew it was going to be interesting to see him in forced interaction with the gated community set.

There was a couple smiling a little too widely to be genuinely happy to see them who were waiting on the front porch when they pulled up. From what Natasha could tell, these were not Missy and David Greene, the sleeper agents posing as affluent homeowners. Though if their identical homes and yards were anything to go by, Natasha wasn’t so sure they _weren’t_ either. The woman was holding an oversized, cellophane-wrapped basket on her hip and waved with her free hand as they exited the car. 

“You must be the Andersons! Welcome!” she said with entirely too much enthusiasm. “I’m Tammy Bradford-Rhys - with a ‘y.’ This is my hubby, Bryan - also with a ‘y’.”

Natasha was not a religious person, but she found herself praying to every higher power she could think of that she would not reach for the pistol strapped to her ankle. Instead, she accepted the gift basket from her orange-skinned, bottle blonde neighbor.

“Well this is just so thoughtful, Tammy,” Natasha said through gritted teeth and set the basket on the ground. “You can call me Natalie and this is my partn- husband, Clint.”

“Without a ‘y’,” Clint added, shaking their hands.

The Bradford-Rhyses laughed a little too loudly at the joke. 

“We would just love to give you a hand,” Tammy said.

“Oh, we have it covered, but thank you,” she interjected. “Really.”

Tammy appeared to process the rejection and quickly recover. “Well then I hope you both can make it to tomorrow night’s HOA meeting. Everyone is just _dying_ to meet the newbies!”

Clint and Natasha exchanged glances and then assured Tammy they would see her and the rest of the community there. Bryan and Tammy left them with an enthusiastic “buh-bye!”. Natasha leaned over once the pair had disappeared four houses down and said to Clint, “This isn’t a gated community. This is hell. This is beige hell.”

 

That evening, the Andersons had been properly moved in and unpacked their “home office.” This consisted of enough surveillance equipment and backup weaponry to take on the entire neighborhood. Clint admitted to feeling naked without a bow, but there wouldn’t be much call for it on this particular mission. He would have to make due with more easily-concealed weapons.

Natasha toweled off after her shower and changed into a camisole and yoga pants. Carefully working out the knots in her hair, she braided her long, red waves back before leaving the master bathroom. She considered the bed - it was large enough for both of them with its California king mattress, but she made it a point to never sleep beside anyone. The second bedroom in the home was being used for Clint’s would-be home office, however.

“Wow,” Clint said when he saw her.

Natasha paused. “What?”

“Nothing... you just look... different,” he stammered. “Nice, you look nice. Like that.”

Raising an eyebrow, Natasha looked down at her outfit and then back at him. “Thanks,” she said. “I’m going to sleep in the bed. You can, too, if you like.”

Clint nodded. “There’s a good acre of mattress. I think we’ll have enough room to spread out.”

Choosing the bed turned out to be an excellent idea because it felt downright heavenly after a long day of travel and moving boxes. The shower’s massager head had pummeled most of the knots out of Natasha’s back, but the mattress provided the right amount of support for her tired frame. Clint watched her from the corner of his eye and looked amused by her appreciative sighs and groans as she settled in. She curled up under the covers and didn’t remember the rest of the night.

~*~

“Should we have brought something?” Clint asked, fiddling with the top button of his shirt and trying to loosen the collar around his neck. “Don’t people bring stuff to other people’s houses?”

Natasha shrugged. “Maybe they’ll give us a pass for just having moved in.”

“Or have us taken out back and shot,” he said.

“I wouldn’t put it past these people.”

Almost on cue, the front door opened to reveal a petite, dark-haired woman who was dressed in what could be best described as maid’s clothing. She greeted them and stood to the side, allowing them to pass into the bustling front room. Natasha took in the group of mostly middle aged couples and noted how alike they were in dress and manner. Every one of them turned their attentions on the new couple, sizing her up as she did them. She looped her arm around his and put on her best face.

Tammy brought them into the center of the crowd, introducing them to each couple. She remembered each and every one, but did not see the marks among them. Clint followed her lead as they ingratiated themselves with the other homeowners, mostly keeping quiet and letting her do the talking as the women in the crowd seemed to do. They received at least three dinner invitations and offers to join book clubs, golf outings, in-home yoga classes, and a few other social activities that Natasha would have otherwise had no interest in. Natalie, however, would be delighted to join them.

Clint and Natasha remained at the meeting in the hopes of strengthening their cover and that they might see the Greenes. According to Tammy, the Greenes had left on a week-long trip the day before Clint and Natasha’s arrival. No information as to where, just that they were visiting a sick relative of Missy Greene’s who lived out of town.

Once the community’s grievances about a new security team for the front gates, acceptable mailbox colors, and regulations about garden gnomes in front yards had been aired, the meeting was wrapped up and the Andersons returned home. Natasha typed up a report on the new information as soon as she was in the front door. Clint grumbled as he removed his button-down shirt and khakis behind her.

“How did we not know this?” he asked. “They could be anywhere right now.”

Natasha closed her netbook. “We hold here and see if they do by next week,” she said calmly. “It will look a lot more suspicious if the new neighbors move out a day after moving in.”

“Did you listen to those people talk? I saw that movie, and the wives turn out to be robots,” he said and pulled on a pair of black pajama pants.

“Funny, I got more of a _Valley of the Dolls_ feel off of this group,” she said, smirking.

Natasha’s gaze was drawn to Clint’s revealed form. Over the years, they had seen each other in various states of undress (and typically, various states of bodily trauma along with that), but there was something different when she looked at Clint like this. He was getting ready for bed, not stripping down in order to patch up a wound from a grazed bullet. Of course, she had been attracted to him from the start, but pushed that side of her down to remain professional. There were times though, times just like this, where being with Clint made her momentarily forget about the job and allowed her to enjoy being with him.

The idea of playing house with Clint for a week until the Greenes returned was sounding better and better by the minute. She rationalized it by not being pinned under heavy fire and by living in a nice house, even if her neighbors may or may not be pod people and she was forced to wear pastels whenever she left the house. 

Natasha found something to sleep in and didn’t bother changing in the other room. She could feel him watching her as she stripped down, but managed to hide the smile that tugged at her mouth.

~*~

By the time Friday rolled around, there had still been no information from S.H.I.E.L.D. on the whereabouts of the Greenes. For all intents and purposes, they had dropped off the face of the earth. Natasha filled her days studying the inhabitants of Gentlewind Bay - their daily rituals, their interactions, and their customs - while Clint “worked” in his office. This work usually entailed waiting on news from HQ and eating cereal while watching daytime television. Wednesday afternoon, she returned home from a morning of recon at the community clubhouse to find him looking very glassy-eyed at a Lifetime movie. She tucked that bit of blackmail-worthy information away in her brain for later use.

From her daily research and observation, Natasha had concluded that they were an incredibly paranoid and insecure bunch and that manifested in the identical fashion sense, the overly friendly, but observant nature, and the need to live behind walls as though Gentlewind Bay were a fortified medieval town. They watched her just as closely as she watched them though with considerably less subtlety. The husbands, when she did encounter them during the day, watched her as well but for a completely different reason.

Gatherings seemed more of an excuse to display wealth and a way for them to check in with each other rather than true camaraderie. It made Natasha wonder if any rule-breakers were ceremonially voted out of the community or punished if caught. In preparation for the community’s potluck block party, Natasha had gone to the Internet to find party recipes that were easy to prepare for a crowd and that would not melt or otherwise degrade while being outside. Pasta salad was something that popped up repeatedly in her research and seemed pretty straightforward: pasta, chopped vegetables, mayonnaise, mustard, relish...

“Sugar?” she exclaimed, her mouth pulling tight in a grimace.

Natasha double-checked the recipe and sure enough - sugar was on the list and she hadn’t misread. Shrugging, Natasha added it to her shopping list. Before she left the house, she made sure to check in on Clint and his _Real Housewives of Orange County_ marathon (he claimed it was further research) to let him know where she was going. 

“Can you get me some Froot Loops?” he asked. “Oh, and some more milk.”

Natasha looked at the stack of dishes that he had yet to bring down to the kitchen and frowned. “Clean up the mess while I’m gone,” she said, “and keep an eye on the gear.”

“I’ve got it set to go off if something weird happens. Not my first time doing surveillance, Tash,” he said with a grin that made her glare at him out of annoyance.

Turning on her heel, Natasha strode down the hallway towards the staircase and called after her, “Those dishes better be clean by the time I get back!”

It only struck Natasha how quickly she had acclimated to domestic life with Clint when she was comparing boxes of different pasta shapes. Her thoughts drifted toward how they might interact if they were themselves and not playing parts for a mission. In some ways, she figured it wouldn’t be so bad to share her private life with him. She trusted him with all other parts of her life, so the logic would follow that she could let him into that area as well. Natasha dropped two boxes of rotini into her basket and made her way to the condiments aisle without any further thought on the matter.

The dishes were hand-washed, dried, and placed back in the cupboard by the time Natasha returned to the house.

While Natasha was preparing the pasta salad, Clint came downstairs fresh from his post-run shower and walked up behind her. Her hand stilled from chopping up the carrots, feeling him leaning over her shoulder. Her body reacted strongly to the clean scent of him.

“You should really know better than to walk up behind me when I’m holding a knife,” she said.

“Tash, you could probably kill me with your bare hands,” he pointed out. “I just wanted to see what you were making.”

“Pasta salad. Did you know they put sugar in this?”

“Uh, yeah. Didn’t you?” Clint replied.

“Pasta salad wasn’t really in the Red Room’s curriculum, Clint.”

He huffed, a quiet laugh against her shoulder. “Good point. Do I get to test it out before the party tomorrow or are you going to threaten me with bodily harm again?”

“You can have some. I don’t know what this stuff is supposed to taste like anyway,” she said and felt him step away from her. “Hey.”

Natasha turned around to look at him and said,“Thanks for doing the dishes.”

With a grin, Clint responded, “Anything for my little woman.”

~*~

With Clint’s approval of both the pasta salad and the sundress that Natasha had put on that Saturday, the Andersons went down to the community clubhouse for the annual block party. Tammy showed Natasha over to the buffet table where she could place the bowl of pasta salad. Judging by the way Tammy reacted to it, she hadn’t expected Natasha to bring something that was homemade. She looked at the rest of the food on the table - it was all professionally made and presented on platters or in warming trays rather than in a large Tupperware container with a lid like her own.

“That is just so quaint! Everyone is going to love it,” Tammy exclaimed in her too bright and bubbly manner. “I brought my famous crab cakes. I hope you don’t have an allergy to them.”

“Oh, um, no. I’m sure they’ll be great, Tammy,” Natasha said. “Let me get one for Clint.”

“Before you do,” Tammy said, keeping her from walking away, “there is someone I would like you to meet.”

Natasha furrowed her brows. “I thought I’d met everyone in the neighborhood.”

“Well, almost. Those sneaky neighbors of yours got back early from their trip,” Tammy said. “I told Missy that you two had moved in while they were gone and she was so excited about meeting you.”

Before Natasha was able to process how the Greenes had slipped past them, Tammy was all but dragging her over to a petite blonde woman who was chatting with Tessa, a woman who lived two houses down from Natasha. The hardened look in her eyes gave away a lot more than the smile she presented Natasha with upon seeing her. It was the look of years of government-facilitated training and carrying out unspeakable acts and Natasha knew it all too well. She was staring at a trained killer in a pale yellow Donna Karan dress.

“Missy, this is Natalie, your new neighbor,” Tammy said, completely unaware of what was really happening. 

“I’m sorry we weren’t home when you and your husband moved in,” Missy said in a measured tone. “Family illness.”

“I understand completely,” Natasha replied, “but Tammy was nice enough to make us feel very welcome.”

Tammy ducked her head and patted Natasha’s arm in a show of gratitude for the compliment.

“I don’t doubt that at all. My husband and I would love to have you two over for dinner,” Missy said. “Are you free tomorrow evening?”

A curl of adrenalin worked up her spine at being so close. “I think we are. Why don’t I go over and talk to him about it, just to be sure?”

Missy nodded, giving Natasha an out. She quickly made her way over to Clint without making it look too obvious and borrowed him from the group of husbands he had been talking to. Playing it off like a quick need for affection, Natasha put her arms around his neck and leaned up to whisper in his ear what had happened. She could feel the warmth of his hands through her dress as they came to rest on the small of her back.

“How did they get back without us knowing?” he asked, turning into the crook of her neck. A small shiver went through her as she felt his surprisingly soft lips against her skin.

“Your guess is as good as mine. We’ll make a plan tonight,” she said and pressed a kiss to his cheek.

Natasha lingered in Clint’s arms just a little longer than necessary.


	2. Chapter 2

Just as Natasha had suspected, the Greenes’ home was nearly identical to their own on the inside. Missy uncorked the bottle of red wine that they had brought, pouring everyone a glass and led them out to the patio. The table was already set with a beach-themed centerpiece and several lit candles. They sat across from each other and Natasha couldn’t help but find it amusing that she was in the middle of a dinner party with two sets of trained assassins with decorative seashells in the middle of them and chit chatting over hors d'oeuvres.

“And how do you two like it in Gentlewind?” David asked. “Missy and I have been here over a year and just love it.”

“Oh, yes,” Natasha said. “It’s so nice to live somewhere so friendly. Everyone has made us feel right at home. Haven’t they, honey?”

Clint looked at her with a smile that felt a little more real than it should have. “They certainly have.”

“How long have you two been married?” Missy inquired, presumably looking for any holes in their story, “Tammy said that you haven’t been married very long.”

“Three years,” she answered, leaning her head on Clint’s shoulder and smiling. 

Clint pressed a kiss to the top of her head and put an arm around her. The Greenes exchanged a look, both commenting on how in love Clint and Natasha seemed. Even as Natasha sat back up in her chair, Clint kept his arm draped over her shoulders. The topic of conversation turned back to the usual topics - work, hobbies, and the weather. From her chair, Natasha could see the back of the house. She catalogued each and every point of entry as she explained that, yes, the weather has been warmer than usual for this time of year. Missy excused herself and walked back into the house to check on dinner.

“You are going to love this,” David said when Missy brought out the main course. “Missy picked up the recipe when we spent a summer in Provence. Have you ever been?”

“I can’t say that we have,” Natasha replied. “We’ve been to Paris a number of times, but never made it down south.”

“Maybe we can convince you to join us next summer in our villa there,” Missy said, setting the plate in front of Natasha.

She looked up with a convincing smile. “I’m sure you won’t have to twist our arms to get us to say yes.”

Natasha studied the plate of chicken and roasted vegetables before her. She could eat it, but ran the risk of Missy having laced the food with poison while she was in the kitchen. Not all poisons were nice enough to warn a person before they ingest them. She could feel Missy watching her a little too closely and made an executive decision. Cutting off a piece of chicken - which did smell amazing and caused Natasha to become acutely aware of how hungry she was - she started to lift it to her mouth and then reacted as though she were going to throw up. The fork dropped with a noisy, metallic clatter, drawing everyone’s attention to her. She covered her mouth, taking a few breaths.

“Is everything okay?” Missy asked.

“I don’t know what came over me,” Natasha said, placing a hand on her supposed upset stomach. “It looks great, I just...”

Clint jumped in and added, “Maybe we should have mentioned it earlier, but Nat is just getting over a stomach thing.”

“Guess I’m not over it yet,” she said, looking pathetically at Clint.

“I’m so sorry, I didn’t realize,” Missy apologized. “Would you like some water crackers to settle your stomach?”

Natasha shook her head, still holding her hand firmly beneath her nose. Clint took over for his poor, nauseated wife and suggested that they take a raincheck on dinner. The Greenes reluctantly allowed them to leave, but sent them home with their dinners in Tupperware containers. Natasha leaned on Clint the entire way home, selling her point until they were inside their house.

“Poisoned?” Clint asked, looking at the leftovers in his hands.

“I didn’t like how Missy was watching me take that first bite,” she explained. “Thanks for playing along.”

“Yeah, but now I have to find something else to eat,” Clint said and dumped out the contents into the trash bin in the kitchen, looking none too pleased about it. “Unless you want to make me dinner, wifey.”

Narrowing her eyes, Natasha replied, following him into the kitchen. “Call me ‘wifey’ again and you aren’t going to like what I serve you.”

Clint grinned and bumped shoulders with her as he walked over to the fridge. She bit back the little smile that threatened to show and leaned against the counter, watching what he was doing. He removed a jar of mayonnaise, mustard, the remainder of a head of lettuce, a tomato, and packages of cheese and deli meat, arranging them on the marble countertop in a neat row. Next, he produced a bag of wheat bread, two plates, and then a butter knife from the drawer to the right of him. Natasha couldn’t remember ever seeing him make his own food; even during the time that they had been in the house, he had never made food in front of her. He was very precise, treating the sandwiches like an assembly line and working his way down. Each sandwich received the same amount of ingredients (except for hers, because he left the mayonnaise off without needing to ask). 

Once finished, Clint presented Natasha with her dinner and looked eager for her to dig in. It was sweet, actually, not just for the fact that he made her a sandwich, but that he wanted to know if she liked it or not. Natasha took a bite and let out an unexpected groan at how good the sandwich was.

“Is the mustard that good?” he laughed.

“Yes,” she said, wiping a bit of it from the corner of her mouth, “and I haven’t eaten since eleven.”

“Not being laced with poison probably helps too,” he said, grinning.

Natasha chuckled in agreement and leaned over, placing a chaste kiss on his cheek. “Thanks for dinner, honey.”

Dinner eaten, Natasha went upstairs to the office to send in her progress report. She heard Clint walk up to the bedroom as she finished typing. For a reason she didn’t quite understand, Natasha thought more about how easily they had fallen into their roles as husband and wife than about their marks’ behavior and sudden return to the neighborhood. Moreover, she found her own reactions to this forced intimacy and to how Clint acted around her interesting. They were close as partners, but having him touch and kiss her just felt good, as though it wasn’t an act.

Natasha sent the report off and checked the surveillance feeds before leaving the room. Clint was brushing his teeth when she walked in. Without thinking about it, Natasha changed out of her dress and into her sleep clothes and entered the bathroom to remove her makeup. They exchanged ideas about what the Greenes were really up to and how they might have known Clint and Natasha’s real identities. 

“We’ll figure it out,” Clint said and touched her hip as he passed behind her, going back into the bedroom.

The touch lingered, still feeling warm against the small patch of bare skin his fingers had brushed against. Natasha closed her eyes and took a breath before going back to her nightly routine. She would be lying to herself if she said that she hadn’t enjoyed that brief skin-on-skin contact. As she left the bathroom, she paused and took in the sight of her “husband” laying in bed, waiting for her, and she swore her pulse quickened. 

“Coming to bed, honey?” Clint asked, smirking at her.

Hiding the smile that turned up at his question, Natasha padded across the room and curled up beside Clint. He switched off the television followed by the lamp on the bedside tables, leaving the bedroom in darkness. Natasha tamped down the urge to close the space between them and rolled over to face the wall. She felt him shift behind her and closed her eyes, quietly hoping he might breach the distance and pull her close.

Clint kept to his side of the bed.

 

Natasha awoke the following morning with a pleasantly warm weight pressed up against her. It took her brain a moment to register that Clint was cuddling with her. It was... nice. She couldn’t remember the last time she felt this kind of human contact and having it come from Clint made it all the more enjoyable. His right arm was draped over her middle with his hand resting on the flat of her bare stomach where her top had ridden up overnight. The height difference between them made it so that his face was buried in her hair. 

“Morning,” he said, the rough edge of his voice awakening something in her that she had thought was long since gone. 

Natasha _wanted_ Clint.

“Uh, hey,” she answered over her shoulder.

Clint bent his head to nuzzle at her neck, breathing deeply. “Just let me enjoy this for a second before you kick me out of bed,” he said.

She laughed quietly. “No, it’s... it’s okay.”

“Oh,” he said, sounding surprised, and moved his hand up a few inches on her abdomen. “Is this okay?”

“Yeah,” she replied and exhaled shakily.

Clint’s hand moved again, up beneath her shirt, just a hair away from her breasts. She felt the heat from his fingers ghosting against the underside of them, he was so close. Her breathing hitched, knowing what he was about to do.

“Is this okay?” he repeated, running the backs of his fingers along the curve of her breast.

Natasha’s reply caught in her throat, forcing her to nod. Clint kept touching her like that and kept just out of reach of the most sensitive part, but it was enough to leave her panting and squirming against him. He opened his palm, testing the weight of each breast and gingerly traced his thumb over her already peaked nipples. Gasping, Natasha arched away from his body and pressed herself into the warmth of his hand. It was so good that Natasha thought she might come just from this contact. 

She was so caught up in the feeling of Clint’s skin against her own that she didn’t notice how hard he was. With the way she had arched away from him, it brought her ass right up against his hips. Having that confirmation only served to turn her on even more and made wetness surge between her thighs.

All too soon, Clint’s hand left her breasts and tucked itself into the juncture of her thighs, cupping her through the cotton shorts she had worn to bed. Her heart slammed against her rib cage at having him touching her so intimately. She ground against his hand, desperate for more of his touch.

“Jesus, Tasha, I can feel how wet you are,” he groaned, pressing his forehead against her bare shoulder. “Are you wet for me?”

“Yes,” she sobbed, still writhing against him. “Please touch me.”

Clint repositioned his hand, slipping it beneath the waistband of her panties. His fingers found her center immediately and she heard him gasp when he felt just how wet she was. It was like he couldn’t believe how much he had turned her on. He ran two digits between her slick folds until he reached her clit which was swollen and begging for attention. Crying out, she pressed into his touch, wordlessly pleading for him to keep touching her. 

Picking up on her cues, Clint’s fingers plunged into her cunt and every remaining shred of self control went out the window. She clawed at the pillow beneath her head, with her other hand reaching behind her to get at his skin. Her fingers dug into what felt like his hip and held on as he fucked her with hand. They moved inside of her like they knew exactly how she needed to be touched.

“Fuck,” Clint groaned, “wanna get my cock inside you. Will you let me, Tasha?”

She gasped as he slipped another digit inside of her. “Yes, _yes_ ,” she cried, feeling him stretch her open and hoped his cock would fill her up just as much. 

Clint withdrew his hand, leaving her cursing and wanting to strangle him until he until he pressed his mouth to hers in a heated kiss. Her entire body responded to the way his mouth felt.

“I’ve wanted to do this for so long,” he said between breaths.

He brought his hands up to to cup Natasha’s face and somehow, she had never realized how striking his eyes were. Blue-green irises with dark flecks throughout and so fucking intense that his gaze had weight to it. She fought against her body’s natural response to avoid this amount of intimacy with the desire she felt for him. 

“What’s wrong?” he asked. 

“Nothing, I just...” she trailed off, trying to find the right words. “Don’t hurt me.”

Something in Clint’s expression changed, softened, and he leaned down to gently kiss her. He knew that she hadn’t meant physically; that was clear from his reaction. The hesitation she had felt a second earlier fell away.

“I promise I won’t,” he said, kissing her again. “I promise.”

They took their time undressing each other, letting mouths and hands linger on every inch of exposed skin. Natasha learned the curves of Clint’s body as he did hers. She quickly came to love the accomplishment and delight that crossed his face every time he found out which parts of her body triggered the strongest reaction. When he set his mouth between her thighs, her body all but came up off the bed, and she could see the satisfaction in his eyes as he looked up at her. 

As Clint worked her with his tongue, his fingers slipped inside of her pussy, pressing right up against her g-spot. Natasha found it difficult to form words, too overwhelmed by what Clint was doing to her. His own deep moans of pleasure rumbled all the way up her body, setting her nerves alight. Shaking, she reached down with both hands and fisted them in his hair. He was getting off on doing this to her and knowing that, being able to feel it in his reactions, was too much for Natasha to handle. It only took a few more swipes of his tongue against her clit and then she was coming hard against his mouth, holding him against her as she shuddered.

Clint took his time making his way up from between her thighs, kissing and licking at random bits of skin until they were face to face. She touched his cheek, her thumb running over his bottom lip and smiled. Tremors still ran through her body as they shared this quiet moment. Even though she had just come, Natasha ached for Clint to be inside of her. Hitching one leg over his hip, she urged him closer and gasped when she felt the intimate contact. 

“I didn’t exactly plan on getting laid,” he said, looking a little embarrassed, and she caught onto his meaning.

“Are you clean?” she asked. “Mine came back all normal last month.”

“Yes...”

Natasha leaned up, giving him a chaste, reassuring kiss. “I want you inside me, Clint.”

Clint’s breathing stuttered, and he appeared to take a moment collect himself before he gathered her up in his arms, kissing her. He rolled them so that he was sitting up against the upholstered headboard and she was sprawled across his lap. She realized in that moment that she knew that she could trust him with this side of her and that he would be with her every step of the way. Carefully positioning herself, Natasha held him at the base and very, very slowly sank down onto his cock. 

Natasha sobbed at the way Clint filled her, stretching her inner walls just so, and she had to steady herself for fear of coming again too soon. It was all too much and every inch of her felt exposed, raw, but still begging for his touch. His hands settled on her hips, so much larger than her own that they spanned the outer curve of her body and almost rested on her lower back. Clint gave her the control that she wanted, letting her set the pace as she began to rock in his lap. All the while, he stared at her as if gauging her reactions, but there was something else in his expression. He looked in total awe of her.

Clint rasped out her name and Natasha quickened her pace, needing to hear it again. Leaning into her, Clint mouthed at one breast and then the other. The stubble on his face sent sparks through her veins as he sucked on her nipples. Again, her fingers threaded through his short, spiky hair in the hopes of purchase. He looked up at her then, a lax smile on his face, and she felt her heart flutter with the realization that it was just for her. 

Still not fully recovered from that first orgasm, Natasha trembled in his arms and let him pull her back for another kiss. Though she had gone through more than her fair share of sexual partners in her past, this moment that she shared with Clint was something else entirely. There was a lack of coercion; she wasn’t doing this because she had to - she was doing this because she wanted to. The gentle but firm way that he handled her set him apart from the others. Whereas they had treated her like an object, Clint touched her with longing and reverence. 

It was that thought that set Natasha off, her orgasm blossoming inside of her body. She dug her nails in, hearing the hiss that came from him, and held on for dear life as she burst into a million tiny pieces. Closing her eyes, Natasha sank down into that beautifully hazy mire of pleasure that had spread outward from the very center of her.

Faintly, Natasha could feel herself still rocking against him. She realized he had tightened his hold on her and was moving her on his cock, seeking out his own end. With a frustrated sound, he switched their positions again and pressed her up against the headboard, his body holding her in place. The change brought her out of the fog she had been in and she drew him back in, legs wrapped around his hips. Her mouth fell open on a sigh as he slid into her in one easy glide. Foreheads touching, Clint pounded into her, too far gone and desperate to maintain the easy pace from a moment ago.

“Clint,” she gasped.

That was all it took to make Clint go still, his cock pulsing within her and filling her with wet heat. A surge of euphoria overtook her, and she welcomed his boneless weight pressing into her body as he slumped forward, too exhausted to keep himself upright any longer. He had just enough energy to raise his mouth to hers, sharing a languid kiss. 

The bright morning sunlight filtered in through the gauzy curtains as they lay there, dozing. Clint had shifted his weight so that he was half-covering her with his body in what felt like a possessive gesture. His head was close to hers and she could feel each deep, restful breath ghost over her skin. Natasha studied his left hand that rested just above her breast. Sunlight glinted off the gold band he wore and somehow, she had never paid any attention to the piece of jewelry. It was similar to one of the rings she wore on her left hand, the simpler of the two. The other was a round, brilliant-cut diamond surrounded by a halo of smaller ones with diamonds along the outside of the band. Something suited for her cover’s tastes but not her own. 

Natasha liked the look of the simple gold ring on Clint’s finger and, being totally honest with herself, what it symbolized even if it were only pretend. She took his hand in both of hers and raised it to her lips, pressing a kiss to the back of it. He hummed quietly into her ear and she could feel him smile.

“I hope that will be a repeat performance,” he murmured, kissing her shoulder.

Natasha laughed. “I’m sure there will be an encore very soon,” she said and rolled them over, grinning down at him.

They did not leave the bedroom until well into the afternoon.

~*~

“Honeymoon period is over, Romanoff,” Fury said, staring Natasha down through the video call. “I want this mission wrapped up by the end of the week. Understood?”

“Yes, sir.”

The call ended so abruptly that Natasha worried Fury knew something about what had been going on between her and Clint. Fraternizing, strictly speaking, was frowned upon at S.H.I.E.L.D. and they had been fraternizing in every room in the house. She shifted her weight and looked at her reflection in the screen. 

“Is Dad mad?” Clint asked, leaning against the door to the office, fresh from the shower.

A slow smile worked its way across Natasha’s face. “No more so than usual. We need to be done by the end of the week.”

“Fair enough. We go in tonight after they’re asleep.”

“That gives us a lot of free time,” she said, stepping up to him. “How are we going to fill it?”

Clint grinned down at her. “I have a few ideas.”

 

Hours later, after the neighborhood had long since gone to bed, Clint and Natasha hopped the fence and gained access to the house. The security system was top of the line, but nothing that Natasha couldn’t handle. It did seem a little strange to her that a pair of sleeper agents should have such an amateurish set-up. This thought occurred to her shortly before everything went black.

Natasha came to in the finished basement of the Greenes’ home with her arms and legs bound to a chair and a splitting headache. There was something tacky on the back of her neck that she ventured to guess was dried blood from the head wound that was making her skull throb. Clint was across from her trussed up in similar fashion though still unconscious. She moved her arms, getting a feel for her bindings and she figured that they were made of a smooth rope, perhaps nylon rope used for yachting (not uncommon to find in houses in this neighborhood). 

“Oh good, you’re awake.”

It was Missy. She stepped in front of Natasha, obscuring her view of Clint and forced Natasha to meet her eyes.

“I have to say, you’re both very good,” Missy said. “If we didn’t know you were coming, we would have been totally fooled by the happy couple act.”

“And where is your husband?”

“Just preparing a few things upstairs. Never you mind.”

“Who told you we were here?” Natasha demanded, keeping her tone level. 

Missy laughed, a clipped sound. “You should know better than that, _Natalya_.”

All at once, Natasha’s heart was pounding. She should have known that she was dealing with one of her own from the start. Missy wasn’t just a Russian sleeper agent, she was trained by the same people who had destroyed Natasha’s childhood and turned her into a killer. Her fingers tightened on Natasha’s jaw, pressing in hard enough to leave a bruise. 

“You may not remember me, but I certainly remember you,” Missy hissed. “I cannot wait to drag your lifeless body back to the Red Room, back where you belong.”

With the proximity and the surge of untapped rage that sprang forth from Missy’s words, Natasha cracked her forehead against the bridge of Missy’s nose. The other spy went reeling backward, swearing with her hand clutching the bloody mess Natasha had left of her nose. It gave Natasha enough time to slip her hand free of her bonds and go for the knife on the bar just to the right of her. With the chair still bound to her at three points, her mobility was restricted.

Missy caught Natasha with just inches to go before she could get her hands on the weapon. A well-placed slap knocked Natasha to the ground, her head making a sickening sound as it connected with the Spanish tiles. She could hear Missy approach before she bent down over her and grabbed a handful of Natasha’s hair.

“Mistake, Romanova,” she snarled. “Now you get to watch while I gut your partner like a fish.”

Missy delivered a hard kick to Natasha’s stomach to emphasize her point. The blow knocked the wind of Natasha, disorienting her for a moment. When her vision cleared, she could see that David had come downstairs and was talking to Missy. There was movement in Natasha’s field of vision - Clint was coming around. A brief feeling of relief broke through the pain. Blinking, he looked at her, eyes going wide when he took in her condition.

“Well look who’s up,” Missy said, walking over to him, knife in hand. She had only wiped some of the blood away from the broken nose that Natasha had given her, and the remainder was turning thick and dark as it dried. “You’re going to become very close friends with my knife unless your partner agrees to cooperate. You see, we have a shared history, she and I. There are some people back in Russia who would just _love_ to see her again.”

“I didn’t realize the Red Room taught Bond Villain Explanations 101,” Clint said with a grin.

The comment earned him the back of Missy’s hand across his face, but it didn’t seem to faze him. That smartass little grin still lingered despite the quickly reddening mark on his cheek. David walked up behind Natasha and gripped her wrists tightly to keep her from making another escape attempt. She had to quickly reassess the situation and come up with another plan that involved only minor physical harm done to Clint.

“I’ll go with you,” Natasha announced. “Just... don’t hurt him.”

Missy looked at her strangely at that sentimental outburst. “They really made you soft, didn’t they?” she asked. “Though you have a point - you are worth more alive. David, take her upstairs.”

Natasha held Clint’s gaze as David removed her bindings and yanked her up by the arms. He started to push her forward, toward the stairs, but she broke free and ran, sobbing her love for Clint and threw herself at him. Missy caught her in the stomach again, shoving her back against David’s solid mass. He was about a foot taller than Natasha and considerably heavier, making it easy for him to move her.

“Sit on her until I’m done with this one,” Missy snapped.

David dragged Natasha upstairs with her fighting him all the way up. The door at the top of the stairs led them into the darkened kitchen. Natasha bided her time and allowed him to push her through into the dining room where she spied a heavy-looking metal statue on the buffet. Stopping short, Natasha dropped to the ground and sent David tumbling over her. She righted herself, grabbing the statue and knocking David unconscious with it. His belt made a good, impromptu wrist restraint and she left him bound to the wooden buffet as she returned to the basement.

The stairs were open, giving Natasha room to jump over the side and right behind Missy. She used the position to her advantage and brought her foot down on the back of Missy’s left knee, pushing her to the floor and wrestling the knife out of her hand. Missy landed on her stomach but bucked Natasha off of her, sending her just to the side and was on her just as quickly as she had gone down. The two women wrestled for control of the knife until they smacked into the the wall behind Clint, somehow having missed him in the midst of fighting. Natasha delivered an elbow to Missy’s face that knocked her down long enough for Natasha to regain possession of the knife. She cut the bindings from Clint’s arms and legs while still keeping an eye on Missy’s body. He helped her to her feet and retrieved the two Glocks that had been taken off of them by the Russians.

Missy made a grab for Natasha but found herself facing not one, but two armed and very pissed off S.H.I.E.L.D. agents. Natasha pressed her boot against Missy’s throat, her gun trained on the other woman’s face.

“Move and I put a bullet between your eyes,” Natasha spat at her in Russian. 

“You have gone soft or you would have slit my throat with that knife instead of saving him,” Missy replied in kind, wincing at the pressure on her windpipe. 

“I really haven’t,” she said, “I just didn’t want to make a mess.”

 

Their backup swept in in record time under the guise of local police, taking custody of the two Russian operatives, and scrubbing down the place. Clint and Natasha returned to the house, ignoring the group of onlooking neighbors that had gathered at the perimeter set up by the other S.H.I.E.L.D. agents upon arrival. They had twenty minutes to pack up and clear out of the house while a couple of agents removed their surveillance gear. Natasha threw her clothes and personal items into her bag without bothering to check herself for wounds. She could do that on the return flight home.

Clint left his own bag on the floor, crossing over to her and kissing her with enough force that she lost her breath. Her hands immediately went around his body, fingers digging into his muscled back as she felt her own make contact with a nearby wall. The impact forced the two apart just for a moment, and they looked at each other, gasping for air. Natasha didn’t know what to say to Clint; there was too much that she couldn’t put words to it, so she pulled him back for another kiss. The adrenalin coursing through her veins made her want to push him back onto the bed, but there just wasn’t enough time. _Later,_ she silently promised him.

Without a word, they shifted back into professional mode and got the hell out of town.

Once the transport was in the air, Clint joined Natasha in the back of the plane to patch up each other’s wounds. Somehow, they had managed to come out of the debacle with just a few bumps and bruises. Natasha stood still as Clint dabbed iodine at the cut on her forehead. She blinked as it stung at the wound, but didn’t flinch, keeping her eyes on his.

“Are we going to talk about what happened?” she asked.

Clint smirked at her. “About you saving my ass yet again or the other thing?”

“Don’t know,” she said, feeling a smile creep up on her. “What’s ‘the other thing?’”

Clint affixed a pair of small butterfly bandages to Natasha’s forehead before he replied. “That other thing that involved this?” he asked, leaning down to brush his lips against hers.

The brief contact made Natasha suck in a breath. “Yes,” she whispered, quickly recovering and steadying herself against him. “I want this, but I want to make sure we don’t let our feelings get mixed up in our work.”

“Well, might be a little too late for me,” Clint said sheepishly. “Tasha, I’ve been crazy about you for a long time. I always try to keep it tucked away, I just can’t do it anymore.”

She smiled at him and knew she would be lying if she denied that her own feelings about him hadn’t taken the same turn. Perhaps they had long before she realized it, but she now felt as though they were on the same page. 

“Maybe I should rephrase it - we try to keep our hands to ourselves in front of our co-workers,” she suggested.

This idea made Clint’s arms wrap around her waist, drawing her body right up against his. Even though they had exposed themselves in every sense of the word, this kind of intimacy made color bloom in Natasha’s cheeks as she lowered her gaze. Clint nuzzled her ear, keeping his tone just loud enough for her to hear over the engines.

“So, I guess we should probably stop,” he said.

“As much as I’d like to attempt sex in the back of a jet, this is probably a bad idea given that there isn’t much back here to give us privacy,” she explained, standing on the balls of her feet to kiss him. “I’d rather wait and make it back to a bed.”

“You make a valid point,” he said with a grin and quickly kissed her.

Managing to disentangle themselves, Clint and Natasha returned to their seats for the remainder of the flight. Natasha stared out the window though it was too cloudy to see the ground below them. Clint’s thigh pressed up against her own and made her smile. She found it strange how the pair of them had been through some incredibly dangerous missions and it was one where they had to play house (albeit with its own amount of hairiness) was the one that brought these feelings to light. However, as Natasha looked at Clint, she didn’t really care how it had happened, just that it had.


End file.
